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August 02, 2005

winding up my fristwatch

"David asked him, 'Why were you not afraid to lift your hand to destroy the LORD's anointed?'" --I Samuel 1:14

I feel I must offer some further clarification in my next retort to Tulsa Blogger Don Singleton. Don's main point (or what I believe to be his main point) is one that I agree with. He says, with respect to in vitro fertilization, that "the evil was in creating so many extra humans, just to discard them." And I agree with him on that point. I think he is right to advocate limitations on the creation and destruction of excess embryos as a routine part of IVF. However, he appends to that argument the idea that since so many existing embryos are going to be destroyed anyway, why not get some benefit from them?

To this I would reply that it matters who does the killing. The stem cells harvested from embryos must be living stem cells. This means they must be taken from living embryos. This means that the harvesting of the stem cells becomes the process which destroys them. In otherwords, if life begins at conception (as Don Singleton and Bill Frist and I all say we believe) then the harvesting of stem cells from an embryo harms, and generally kills a human life. The fact that such human lives are "routinely destroyed anyway" is immaterial, from a moral standpoint.

And even if it were possible to get viable stem cells from dead embryos, to do so would be to form a partnership with those who created the embryos in the first place. Inevitably we become bound to those who create excess embryos doomed to destruction by the cords of commerce. It is analogous to the settlements which various state governments won against Big Tobacco several years ago. Once lucrative settlements had been awarded, with billion dollar payouts to state governments stretching over the coming years, suddenly the states' efforts to stamp out evil and dangerous tobacco use became less credible. The tobacco companies saw an opportunity to become the golden goose, and they took it, and a strange, greasy fellowship ensued, with states who had been roaring about the expense and suffering caused by tobacco suddenly going quiet. And the kids just kept lighting up.

And like the conflicted winners in the battle against Big Tobacco, the Fristian sabre rattling about the sanctity of life from conception gets a little quieter, and a little less credible. And Frist's words become a little more Orwellian, as when he said recently that we must "ensure the highest level of respect for the moral significance of the human embryo." His arguments for life are losing strength; it's hard to argue that you're famished when your mouth is full.

IVF's frozen leftovers have the potential to become a golden goose. When viewed as a repository of stem cells, they are a gold mine. But then, you and I are a gold mine too, when viewed as a source of transplantable tissue and organs. And the Jews of Europe were viewed as a gold mine by the Nazi party of mid 30's Germany; a valuable source of confiscated property, of labor, of research test subjects, of gold fillings, and of human hair. Would to God this could never happen in the West again. But if it is happening again, we ought to keep our arguments sound and strong, and we ought to advocate, and remonstrate, and be of some help in bringing humanity back to sanity.

Posted by joel at August 2, 2005 12:33 AM

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